A Question of Whom
by lucifer ravana
Summary: Experts say that with a mere blink of an eye, a person can dream. The dreams last but a second and within that second, an entire life can be made up. A life completely different from the one you're living now.


This was the final face-off. The setting was during the day and the area wasn't heavily populated. Few had survived for the final showdown. Voldemort stood off to the side, his remaining Death Eaters now massacring what remained of the Order members. Harry, his wand in hand, stood opposite the Dark Lord.

There was no need to bow. There was no use for paces. There was only the raising of wands.

"Avada Kedavra!"

A flash of green light shot right for Harry.

Harry Potter awoke quickly, a thin sheen of sweat upon his naked torso. Clad only in black pajama bottoms, he shut off the aggravating alarm clock that rested upon his nightstand even before he could fully become aware of his surroundings.

He was not within his Hogwarts bed. Nor was he within the house on Privet Drive. The walls of his bedroom stared down at him, covered with a few posters of several rock bands and his favorite rugby team.

His desk held a clutter of papers that he didn't recognise and his clothes, not the raggedy hand me downs from Dudley nor the Hogwarts uniform, rested untidely upon the floor from where he had thrown them.

Slowly, unsure of himself, he got out of his comfortable bed, trod over to his closet and opened up the doors. A small pile of clothing fell upon his head as though they had been thrown in there and the door hastily shut to prevent them from falling out.

Quickly dressed himself, he exited the strange, unfamiliar bedroom. The rest of the house seemed just as odd to him as his room. There were no Dursleys to be seen and the smell of toast and melted cheese drifted up to him.

"Harry! Breakfast!" A strange feminine voice.

Hurrying down the stairs of the house, he entered the kitchen area to be greeted with...

"Mum?"

Lily Potter took the toast pieces out of the toaster, plopping them down onto a plate. "Sorry I don't have time to make anything more for you. I've got to get to work, honey. Eat quickly. You don't want to be late for school."

Harry could only take in the sight in front of him. His mother, wth her red hair and smiling face, seemed so real. He couldn't help reaching out and hugging her tightly around the waist.

"Oof, honey. This won't get you your allowance any faster. Eat quickly!"

Harry didn't care about breakfast. He cared about the feeling of warmth he was getting from the woman next to him. His mother. She smelled like his mother though he wasn't sure how he knew what she would smell like. She sounded like his mother. She felt like his mother.

"Harry?"

"I..sure, mum. It's just..good to see you." He didn't want to let her go and his hold only loosened when Lily took his arms off herself. She gave him a soft kiss on the top of his head.

"I need to get to work. I'm late as it is. Your father will be home at seven tonight. So come home right after school and no snacking. You'll spoil your dinner."

His..father?

Harry didn't have time to question his mother as Lily grabbed ahold of her briefcase and headed off in her car.

Cars?

But she was a witch. So shouldn't she..

She was also dead.

Ignoring his breakfast, Harry quickly ran back upstairs and to the bathroom. He didn't know how he knew where he was going. He was simply following his own instinct.

The mirror showed him the truth he was seeking. No matter how many times he moved his hair or parted it, there was no sign of the scar.

School. Harry Potter went to school. He was in his last year before graduating and going on to University. He walked to school every day and was majoring in science.

He was also terribly confused about everything. What had happened to his life? He had been a wizard and his parents had been killed and there was Voldemort. Yes, he had been about to destroy Voldemort for the final time when suddenly..he had woken up.

Had he dreamed it all?

A poster on a telephone pole caught his eye and he backtracked to get a better look at it. The sign was an advertisement for a music group coming to his hometown. A large 'sold out' was posted underneath. The words didn't interest Harry, though. The faces upon the poster did. The band was called 'Ill Faith' and he made out the faces of Draco, Lucius, and Narcissa Malfoy.

Only..they weren't. Rather, they were called Lucifer, Draconus, and Narcissus of Ill Faith. Coming to your town soon! Tickets go on sale...

Harry sped on to school, at a loss of what to think.

Ron plopped his lunch down next to Harry. "Honestly. The very least they could do is try harder. The teacher wants to grade on a curve in order to give the dumber students more of a chance. They should study more. There's not much else to it. Teachers shouldn't be giving allowances to people who just don't try."

Ron Weasley is Harry Potter's best friend. A perfect student with the perfect grades and perfect attendance record, he had been friends with Harry since they were both in Kindergarten. The two of them had done everything together and were rarely seen apart.

They also lusted after the same girl.

Hermione Granger placed her tray down across from them. "Ron, your sister told me that you had gotten tickets to Ill Faith this weekend."

"That I did. Would you care to be my date for the event?" Ron asked with a smile that showed the gap between his two front teeth.

Hermione scowled. "No. I can't believe you actually paid money for those tickets. Don't you know that rock bands help to contribute to the amount of noise pollution today? Also, you know that wherever that group goes, there's always a mob with them. It'll just end up in a riot."

Harry tuned the two of them out. Hermione and Ron. Both familiar faces and yet, not. He felt like the odd one out for once, unsure of where he stood with either of them. At least, until they both looked to him.

"Tell Hermione that there's nothing wrong with attending a mere concert, Harry."

"Tell Ron that there'a plenty wrong with acting like an idiot and participating in a mosh pit."

"There will not be a mosh pit."

"Like you could tell. You can't foresee the future, Ron Weasley."

"Nor can you."

Harry was starting to feel back in place.

"Now, who here cares to tell us the differences in the two opposing political powers?"

Harry kept his hand down and slouched in his chair. Since this morning, he felt as though he had awoken from a deep slumber and wasn't sure if he was well-rested or not. This all seemed like a strange new world to him. Different and yet, peacefully so.

He had his mum and dad. He still had Hermione and Ron. The Malfoys weren't a threat and there was no word of the Death Eaters or Voldemort in this world.

"Dumbledore wishes to raise taxes in order to straighten out the economy while Riddle wishes to decrease the taxes and raise the money on exports."

"Very good! That's one difference of opinion."

Right after school, Harry rushed to the newstand and purchased himself a newspaper.

Riddle and Dumbledore. The two political heavyweights of the country. Elections will be held tomorrow. Tax reform. Social security reform. Military reform.

"Heavy stuff, ain't it?" The vendor asked him, noticing Harry's pale complexion. "The two seem completely deadlocked in the polls."

Harry could only nod.

Dinner seemed surreal. James Potter came home. Lily Potter came home and the small family sat down to eat. Harry managed to tune out the political talk at the table but his breath kept hitching every time Riddle was mentioned.

He listened to his mother as she spoke about her job as a lawyer. "Did you know they wanted to fire that nice janitor today? Simply because he's a bit on the slow side."

"Really? What did he do?"

"They claimed he set a small fire. Even if he did, that's hardly anything to worry about. The blaze was quickly put out."

"Didn't we bring him something once? What was his name?"

"Hagrid. Yes, we brought him a small cake last Christmas."

Yes, dinner was entirely surreal.

Nothing seemed right at all. Harry made a list of everyone he had seen that day, everything that was different from before he went to sleep.

His parents were alive and yet, why were they? Did he dream that they had died? Did he dream everything that had happened to him? Was Hogwarts fake? Was he just displacing names and figureheads for..for his dreams?

Instead of Quidditch, he played Rugby, though he was far from the best at the game. Were his dreams of Quidditch and being a great Seeker brought on due to his want of being a hero?

Ron's family. They were middle-class people and Arthur Weasley worked in the government. They made a decent living and were far from broke. Had Harry put Ron down as being broke only to raise up his own living situation in the present time?

He wasn't rich. Hermione wasn't the know-it-all. Professor McGonagall was the Headmaster of his school and Professor Snape was...he was the home ec. teacher and Harry had nearly burst out laughing upon hearing that.

Sirius Black was his uncle, adopted from his father's side. Remus Lupin was a friend of the family who worked with Harry's father.

It seemed as though everyone had a place to fit in within this world. What had happened to his own, though?

His homework was normal. Science, maths, English...no Runes, no Defense against the Dark Arts, not even Potions.

He couldn't perform any spells and just in case he was within a dream himself, he had pinched his arm several times during the day, each time feeling the sharp pain.

Who was he and why did this world feel so right and yet, so wrong?

Harry didn't know whether or not to be disturbed that he had several of Ill Faith's music albums.

Upon listening to some of their music, he found the beat catching and the lyrics seemed to resonate a part of him that he couldn't define. He felt as though they were singing specifically to someone, calling on this person to show themselves.

He fell asleep with their music playing on his headset.

Harry awoke after only a short slumber, knowing that his world was wrong. The headphones were yanked off his head, the tape cassette having run out long ago.

The feeling that had haunted him for so long was only now being realized. His world, while seemingly ideal, was normal. He was living in a normal world, in a normal life, a normal childhood. He had his parents, friends, rivals, and relatives. There were no Dark Lords, no wizards or witches. This was what he had dreamed of in his dreams.

Yet, it was all wrong. There was but one element that had yet to be unsolved and until Harry was sure that his nightmare was put to rest, he first had to confront the thing in his dreams.

He went silently to the bathroom and locked the door behind him. He had no magic to him. He had only his own wits and soon, he would have the one thing that always distinguished him from the other world. In order to confront his own demon, he had to become what he had dreamed about.

Taking out the blade from his father's razor, he combed his hair to the side, exposing his forehead. Methodically and painfully, he sliced open his own skin in a jagged cut. Small and red, he continued downward diagonally, continuing to cut open his own flesh.

Strange, he had thought self-mutilation would hurt more. Instead, he was only confronted with a feeling of peace. What he was doing wasn't wrong, it was necessary and he had long since become accustomed to doing what needed to be done in order to fight the good fight.

The blade was thrown away after the job had been done. There was quite a bit of blood which Harry managed to clean up and wipe off the sink. His forehead was washed and a towel was placed to the scar.

A few minutes later, he had his brand.

Harry did not remember sneaking out of his house. He was dressed in dark clothes and his graduation robe which was the closest thing he had to an actual robe.

He had no wand but a steak knife from out the drawer in the kitchen would have to suffice.

His movements were quick even though he wasn't sure precisely where he was going. He had an idea, though, a theory. In a world so right for him, there had to be one wrong element. One thing that did not fit into his world. He had to seek out that element and kill it, for that was the one thing that controlled his own fate and destiny.

There was only one place where this element would be. In a place where no one would bother to look except him. Underground.

The manholes he encountered were all bolted shut and he had to continue on his way into downtown to find a manhole being worked upon. There was always some construction work in large cities and London was no exception. For now, in the dark of the night, there was no one about. Orange cones were set up along with signs stating that there was an open manhole and not to go near it.

Harry bypassed the signs and set to descending down into the recesses of the underground. The ladder felt slimy to him and he ignored the stench building around his body. His feet soon touched the wet ground of the sewer and he could have sworn he saw the shadow of the Basilisk along the dark walls.

Was this his mind playing tricks on him? Or was this Him?

He did not know how long he walked for, only that he was headed in the right direction. There were many ladders leading up to the other manholes. He could have gone through them and abandoned his quest at any time but no. He had his mission, his goal. He needed to destroy the one thing that was wrong in his world, the one piece of the puzzle that did not fit in.

"I knew you would come."

Harry had expected Tom Riddle. He should have known better. There was no ghostly boy waiting for him at the end of the tunnel. Riddle already had a place in his world, Dumbledore's opposition.

Voldemort stood before him now, his red eyes ablaze with an amused intensity.

"You should not have come."

Harry stood his ground, facing off his old nemesis just as he had in the dream. The steak knife was brought out and held up. Though it was dark within the sewers, the blade glinted in the shadows.

"Did you create this world or did I?" He asked the Dark Lord, voice unafraid.

Voldemort merely shrugged. "Does it matter?"

No, it really didn't. Nothing mattered but the end. Harry had sworn that he would take down Voldemort. In the end, the worlds could be different, the setting located elsewhere, the times having changed, but all in all, his world ended here.

Harry dove at the Dark Lord, the knife coming down. Voldemort made no move to defend himself and when the blade plunged into the man's skin, Harry felt somehow vindicated.

"No matter what you do, I am still Harry Potter! I am Harry Potter!"

"I am Harry Pot-"

The words ended and Harry only had time to blink as he felt his body being thrown into the air, the green light taking him up, up, up, and in that blink, he saw his world, his life of normalcy. A world he had wished to be a part of instead of this one.

His body landed upon the ground, the killing curse escaping with his life.

The Order stared at their fallen hero as the Death Eaters converged upon them.

Voldemort made his way up to his fallen rival and nudged the body with his foot. Dead. The famous Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, was now finally gone from this world. But the Dark Lord had been merciful. He had given the young man one final chance to dream. 


End file.
